Ivan Shapiro, An Advocate On Social Issues
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Ivan Shapiro, a real estate lawyer and former president of the Ethical Culture Society, who was also a leader in organizations concerned with civil liberties and the homeless, died Nov. 5. He was 69 and lived on the East Side of Manhattan. The cause was complications from Alzheimer’s disease and cancer, his wife, Maria, said. Mr. Shapiro was born in New York City in 1928. He graduated from City College in 1948, and from Harvard Law School in 1951, specializing in real estate law. He became a partner at the law firms of Wein, Lane & Malkin and Greenbaum, Wolff & Ernst before joining Willkie, Farr & Gallagher in 1981. Parallel to his legal career, Mr. Shapiro became a leader of the Ethical Culture Society; he was its president from 1972 to 1978 and chairman of its schools from 1977 to 1982. Mr. Shapiro also became a member of the New York Civil Liberties Union, joining its board in 1966 and later becoming its treasurer. There, he focused on abortion rights and the separation of church and state, a topic he often addressed in speeches broadcast from the Ethical Cultural Society’s Sunday meetings. ”He was someone who didn’t get the visibility, but he was a pillar of the development of the modern-day civil liberties union,” said Norman Siegel, executive director of the New York Civil Liberties Union. ”He helped frame some of the most important civil liberty issues of the late 20th century, and he did it in a humanistic way.” More : query.nytimes.com |